Kim Atkins Artists’ Statement
I am a landscape painter and I like to work directly from the subject.
Plein-air painting gives me a chance to sit and look at a subject over a period of time. I work in oils, often starting with a drawing or a small watercolour. Oil painting is a deliberate and thoughtful medium. You can change your mind. The oils permit you to work over a period of time. Or to combine the media with other materials.
I am happy to be outside and have worked directly in every month of the year.
This period of lockdown meant that there has been time to work – maybe a different kind of time – but for me time to try different subjects and new combinations of media too. To experiment more.
Kim Atkins is a native of Boston Massachusetts. She earned a Fine Arts degree in the USA and then moved to England. She worked in residential child care and refugee resettlement for a private British charity.
After completing a Youth Worker Diploma at Leicester University, Kim emigrated to Canada and taught visual art and photography in a number of high schools in Toronto. During this time she took four leaves from teaching to travel and study in Europe and Central America.
Kim became involved in local arts development and has served on the Board of the Artists Network of Riverdale and of Gallery 44- The Centre for Contemporary Photography. She is currently a member of the executive of the Ontario Society of Artists.
The PORDS – our painting group grew out of a shared love of painting and travel. We have taught, studied, travelled and exhibited together. The painting trips have taken us to Europe, Mexico, the USA and almost every province in Canada.
Kim’s work is in collections in England, France, Italy, the USA, Cuba, and in Canada.
